Circulating Tumor Cells

Circulating tumor cells provide a dynamic view of cancer progression

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are cancer cells that migrate out from tumor masses and enter the blood stream. Once in the circulation, they have the potential to engraft in distant tissues to develop into new tumors (metastases). It is this tumor spread that is responsible for most cancer deaths. Since all distant tumors were derived from CTCs, it is likely that these cells will hold many valuable clues to the biology of metastatic cancer.

AccuCyte-CyteFinder is the ideal platform for rare CTC isolation and analysis

The AccuCyte-CyteFinder is a fully integrated platform for isolation, identification, analysis and retrieval of rare single circulating tumor cells. The platform offers multiple important benefits.

The RareCyte platform integrates three essential technologies.

AccuCyte: Comprehensive, highly reproducible CTC collection.

With AccuCyte, cell collection is based only on cell density, which is similar for all nucleated cells. The technology does not use cell lysis and is independent of cell surface markers or cell size, factors that are known to vary in CTCs. This ensures comprehensive collection of the entire population of CTCs for analysis.

CyteFinder: 6-channel fluorescence detection.

Isolated CTCs can be thoroughly characterized in up to six fluorescence channels with the companion CyteFinder. Fluorescence analysis is completely independent of cell isolation. This unique design allows the development of highly customized tracking and enumeration schemes tailored to the specific needs of the research.

CytePicker: Individual CTC isolation.

The integrated CytePicker feature facilitates quick and accurate retrieval of individual CTCs of interest. These cells can be prepped for next generation sequencing or other downstream analyses.

CTCs are cancer cells that migrate out from tumor masses, and enter the blood stream. Once in the circulation, they have the potential to engraft in distant tissues to develop into new tumors. It is this tumor spread that is responsible for most cancer deaths. Since all distant tumors were derived from CTCs, CTCs hold clues to the biology of metastatic cancer.

Why is monitoring CTCs important?

The number of CTCs in circulation has been demonstrated to be prognostic of recurrence and treatment outcome in many types of cancer. Finding CTCs is difficult, however, because they are rare (typically one CTC per ml of blood) and require discovery methods that are sensitive and specific

The additional power of CTC genomics.

Powerful NGS technologies enable all variations of genomic analysis from single cells. The sensitive and specific RareCyte platform now extends this analytical capability to extremely rare single CTCs. As tumors progress during the course of disease – either naturally or in response to treatment – genomic analysis can provide invaluable insights and guidance.

The RareCyte platform is a foundation for genomic analysis.

RareCyte’s AccuCyte® – CyteFinder® system uses the characteristic density and protein expression of CTCs to identify them in the blood. It consistently finds over >90% of model CTCs when spiked into blood, and can detect a single CTC in a tube of whole blood (see Campton, et al., BMC Cancer. 2015 May 6; 15:360).

The technology is flexible – it allows the user to incorporate stains for research biomarkers of interest in addition to traditional epithelial markers used for identification of CTCs. This includes markers of specific cell lineage – such as breast or prostate cancer or melanoma markers – and of physiology – such as proliferation or mesenchymal transition. It is also possible to investigate variability in expression of biomarkers in CTCs in a single patient.